Oooh, it's been a long summer! People sick, struggling, splitting up, falling apart… The phone's been ringing off the hook, people I love and people I've never even heard of calling to tell me sorrowful things, wanting a bit of… what do they want? What do I have to offer anyhow? Yikes.
Mid-July was Tisha B'av, the holiday of mourning for the destroyed Temple in Jerusalem. The Temple was destroyed twice, by the Babylonians and then by the Romans. Over the years, rabbinic history dated various other troubles and tragedies on top of Tisha B'av: the terminal battle of the Bar Kokhba Revolt, the expulsion of the Jews from England in 1290 and from Spain in 1492. I have come to think of Tisha B'av as a day of mourning and crying for all the world's catastrophes. And indeed here in our shul, we mourn for war and famine and genocide, species loss, cancer, global warming, torture, hunger, epidemic, injustice wherever and whenever they occur in our world. You'll understand when I say, only slightly tongue-in-cheek, that Tisha B'av has become my favorite holiday…
Immediately following Tisha B'av comes the season we are in now: the season of consolation. For the seven Shabbatot between Tisha B'av and Rosh Hashana, special words of consolation are added to the service in the form of beautiful, poetic haftarot (passages from the biblical prophets) which speak of comfort, healing and victory in days to come (or better, Days to Come.)
This past Friday night, in the sweet little shtibel at the back of the Frankstons' house, our once-a-month Friday night minyan was gathered. And I asked people about consolation. When they have been in straits, what has consoled them? And it was interesting to me that no one spoke like Isaiah speaks. No one spoke of looking ahead to streets paved with jewels in Days to Come. No one spoke of revenge, reward or restitution. In fact, no one talked about anything being changed or fixed at all. People talked about being touched, physically and spiritually, held while they grieved. They talked about loving mates, friends, family members offering a hand. They talked about realizing that they were not alone, not isolated. They talked about being consoled by loving human presence -- while they struggled, while they were ill or grieving, not in the future.
For our women's retreat (coming up in a few days from when I am writing these notes) I have been reading, among other things, a little bit about cell senescence (a fancy word for death.) Some scientists speculate that if cells were to live on and keep dividing forever, they would keep picking up mutations until they inevitably became cancerous. So cells are in a sense programmed to die after a certain number of replications and new, undamaged cells to take their places. I can pretty much accept, even admire, the notion that cells, and therefore whole organisms, are programmed to die.
I can even accept, at some level, that everything in life ends -- sometimes with death, sometimes with other kinds of change. Vacations end, parties end, visits end. Relationships sometimes end, or at least change. Youth ends. Nations end. Regimes end. Wars end (eventually.)
Sometimes I might even get a glimpse, for a second or two, from a height at which I can see huge and terrible events -- wars, atom bombs, famines -- as being little different than cats killing birds or crabgrass choking out other plants. At that moment I might also be able to be philosophical about my ill and burdened friends and neighbors. It's all just life, after all. As I often say, or think: "We're lucky to be here at all, for however long the party lasts…"
There are scientists who are trying to interfere with cell senescence, to make it possible for cells -- and organisms -- to live forever. But the majority opinion seems to be that this isn't really a good idea. It causes new problems. We really ought to let death be. We are not powerful enough, or smart enough, to interfere with the basic running of the world, in which change, loss and ending are built right in.
But we can console each other. This IS within our power. We can show up at difficult times, and we can touch each other. We probably can't change death or loss. But we can change isolation. This is a wonderful capacity that we all have
We are on the brink of a new year, 5768. I hope that it is full of nothing but good fortune for all of us and for everyone! But even if it turns out to be more wrinkled than that, I hope that we all have the honor of using our power to bring consolation to someplace where it is needed. And that, by doing so, we will bring happiness to people who suffer and to ourselves.
I wish you all, and everyone you love, a year of connection, love, meaning and peace.
© 2007 Rabbi Margaret Holub
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Updated 09/02/2007(rge)